noirish Los Angeles

[HossC]

Originally Posted by Scott Charles

I don't know if it helps anything, but I cleaned the photo up a bit in Photoshop, straightened the verticals, etc:

This appears to be the left side of the same building. It shows Geo Rice & Sons Printers at 311 New High Street in 1895.


LAPL

The building is missing from the center of this circa 1930 photo. On the right, 325 New High Street was a musical instrument dealer owned by W L Glockner, 327 was the Dante Hotel, and 329 was a restaurant belonging to Pedro Campos (from the 1929 CD). There's no listing for 317 New High Street in 1929, but 321 appears to be a city garage (Wm Orr, foreman).


USC Digital Library (cropped)

[CityBoyDoug]

Originally Posted by GaylordWilshire

USCDL


We've seen this image before--looking east on Wilshire from just west of Wilton...the apartment building at left was a mystery I thought we'd covered a while back, but the posts elude me. Anyway, at the risk of repetition, it was built facing Gramercy in 1921 and moved 14 years later to Seventh St just west of St. Andrews, where it survived until 1986. The full story of the Wilshire/Gramercy corner is here.


NEVERMIND on that...found the old post. It was #37759, not even two years ago.


How about something new re the building at the NEC of Wilshire & Gramercy? Pictures of the Hi-Hat taken by Willard D. Morgan are featured in a new post on historian John Crosse's invaluable blog Southern California Architectural History. (With more here.)


HLA

So far NLA has covered over 67,000 apartment and commercial buildings. That leaves us 112,000 left to investigate. Should be all done soon.
Ya'll are doin great.

[HossC]

Originally Posted by odinthor

e_r, Catalina put the fun in funicular!


odinthor collection and http://web.csulb.edu/~odinthor/socal24.html

and


odinthor collection and http://web.csulb.edu/~odinthor/socal24.html

I went looking for pictures of the Catalina incline, and this circa 1914 view was the first that I found.



This enlargement shows a performance area in the lower-left corner and a pergola-like station (as seen on odinthor's postcards). There's also a bridge halfway up the incline.


USC Digital Library

This image is dated circa 1900, but I believe it may be more like 1905. It shows an earlier, covered lower station.



The full image shows the harbor full of small boats. Note the absence of the performance area.


USC Digital Library

Then I really got lucky with this shot looking up the incline. It's dated 1910 (no "circa"), and appears to show the same covered station at the image above. The top station looks more substantial.



Here's a close-up of the pricing. It looks like passengers had to press the button on the right to ride the incline.


USC Digital Library

I wondered why the pricing sign mentioned a second trip to Lover's Cove, and then found the answer. There was a second funicular over the hill!



I'll finish with this close-up.


USC Digital Library

[odinthor]

Originally Posted by HossC

I went looking for pictures of the Catalina incline, and this circa 1914 view was the first that I found.



This enlargement shows a performance area in the lower-left corner and a pergola-like station (as seen on odinthor's postcards). There's also a bridge halfway up the incline.


USC Digital Library

This image is dated circa 1900, but I believe it may be more like 1905. It shows an earlier, covered lower station.



The full image shows the harbor full of small boats. Note the absence of the performance area.


USC Digital Library

Then I really got lucky with this shot looking up the incline. It's dated 1910 (no "circa"), and appears to show the same covered station at the image above. The top station looks more substantial.



Here's a close-up of the pricing. It looks like passengers had to press the button on the right to ride the incline.


USC Digital Library

I wondered why the pricing sign mentioned a second trip to Lover's Cove, and then found the answer. There was a second funicular over the hill!



I'll finish with this close-up.


USC Digital Library

Thanks, HossC! Very good pix.

I've always assumed that the two cars "balanced" each other, and the Lover's Cove car went down when the Avalon-side car went up, and vice-versa. In other words, same idea as Angels Flight, except the cars weren't side-by-side.

The three roads cut into the hillside (it's a little hard to see the lowest of the three), as seen in the Lover's Cove view, no longer exist, and the hillside was restored to natural state, very skillfully, long ago...with the sole little-known exception of what, if memory serves, is called the "Banning Bench," a bench which, if one makes one's way through the chaparral, is to be found at the top of the "point" between Avalon and Lover's Cove . I'm pretty sure that once upon a time the bench-spot adjoined the lowest of the three now-gone roads.


gsv

The bench--which I've visited--is of course set back a bit from the edge, up where you see the cloud. One walks down to it, through the underbrush, from the site of Buena Vista Park (where the structure for the funicular was). Down below nowadays is the jetty etc. where most visitors debark; and I believe there's a helipad too, and a ramp for sea-planes, adjoining the "visitor welcome" buildings. The twenty-five cents charge is rather substantial for ca. 1910, is it not? Meantime, it's pretty whimsical--exactly in the spirit of Catalina--to call it the "Island Mountain Railway." Sigh, I'd pay a nice lump of money to own that Island Mountain Railway sign!

[CityBoyDoug]

Originally Posted by [B

odinthor[/B];8307953]Thanks, HossC! Very good pix.

Odin

25 Cents in 1910 is about $6.50 in 2018. Mildly pricey in those days. 1910 was when 10 cents would buy a whole chicken for dinner. The fact is that the US dollar was lost about 90+ % of its former luster.

[GaylordWilshire]

??

It has if you're still making 22 cents an hour. If not, its luster is about the same.

[CityBoyDoug]

Originally Posted by GaylordWilshire

??

It has if you're still making 22 cents an hour. If not, its luster is about the same.

Thanks GW for always commenting on my posts. Your constant attention to my utterances are a comfort. Keep watching. I always know I have you to be alert and on the job. Most appreciative.

[ethereal_reality]

Quit yer' bickerin' you two.




Here are the four 'mystery' slides that I mentioned last night.

#1


ebay / no longer listed






#2


ebay / no longer listed







#3


ebay / no longer listed







#4 (this last one isn't exactly a mystery )


ebay / no longer listed


My slide notes suggest they're from the 1970s [except for the last one. I believe it's from the 1980s]
and the first two are somewhere in West L.A.

__

[ethereal_reality]

re: Kaestner & Brown General Book Binding Co. Los Angeles

Originally Posted by Beaudry

That is a great image! According to the directories, Kaestner & Brown were at 317 New High Street.

Originally Posted by HossC

The building is missing from the center of this circa 1930 photo.

I'm confused. How can the building be missing? The Kaestner building is obviously older than 1930
and the building in it's place appears to be even older than the Kaestner Bldg.



Did ya'll notice this LARGE pulley?


detail / full photo HERE

No doubt to ease the task of raising and lowering the extraordinarily long window. (I think)

__

[ethereal_reality]

And what's up with the goober upstairs?


detail / full photo HERE

[ethereal_reality]

Originally Posted by HossC

There was a second funicular over the hill!

Wow...that's such a great discovery Hoss! No wonder I didn't know where to look.


If you look closely, you can see the Lover's Cove Incline in this 1907 postcard



found HERE printed in Germany

from this distance, the incline basically looks like steps leading down to the water. (note that the incline isn't even mention on the postcard)


_

[CityBoyDoug]

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality

Quit yer' bickerin' you two.

__

.............
ER is such a darling.

[HossC]

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality

Here are the four 'mystery' slides that I mentioned last night.

#1


ebay / no longer listed

This one shows the Hillcrest Country Club, just south of Century City. We're looking southeast down Motor Avenue.


Google Maps

[GaylordWilshire]

Detail of the entrance of the Satyr Book Shop's branch at 3929 Wilshire in the Bilicke Building--entrance designed by Julius R. Davidson, image by Willard D. Morgan. From John Crosse's Southern California Architectural History. The shop is seen below between the Wilshire Special and the Brown Derby branch that came between the same restaurateur's Hi-Hat (i.e., Mr. Gloria Swanson) and Perino's, which took over the Satyr's space...as we may or may not have seen on NLA before.


Historic Los Angeles



PS...meanwhile, over on Vine street....the connection between the Derby and the Satyr was Herbert Somborn's partnership in the bookshop...
Some detail of the Vine St shop is at http://readinkbooks.com


From ER's post 47152

[ethereal_reality]

'mystery' fountain

Since I've had Catalina on my mind the last dew days this slide from the 1950s caught my eye.


EBAY

What caught my eye is that rustic looking fountain.* Does anyone know if it's still there?
As you can see, it is somewhere quite close to the steamship pier.
I've been to Catalina twice, maybe three times, and I don't remember seeing this, rather large, impressive fountain.

*of course I was in my early twenties at the time, and a bit squirrely, so I might have just...walked right past the fountain)



__

[HenryHuntington]

Here are the four 'mystery' slides that I mentioned last night.


#2


ebay / no longer listed



My slide notes suggest they're from the 1970s [except for the last one. I believe it's from the 1980s]
and the first two are somewhere in West L.A.

__[/QUOTE]

I'm pretty sure that the major intersection in the upper right corner is Pico & Sepulveda Blvds. The street running approximately across the top of the photo is Sepulveda. Moving down the photo, the other streets are Pontius Ave. and Cotner Ave. The San Diego Freeway is just out of the frame at the bottom.

The trackage shown crossing Pico and then curving north adjacent to Sepulveda was LAP/PE's Soldiers Home Branch, which ran from its connections to the Santa Monica Air Line at Exposition Blvd. to what is now the VA's Sawtelle facility.

[Handsome Stranger]

Originally Posted by HenryHuntington

I'm pretty sure that the major intersection in the upper right corner is Pico & Sepulveda Blvds.

Yeah...thanks for the earworm, buddy. (Also, I think you're correct.)

[odinthor]

Originally Posted by ethereal_reality

'mystery' fountain

Since I've had Catalina on my mind the last dew days this slide from the 1950s caught my eye.


EBAY

What caught my eye is that rustic looking fountain.* Does anyone know if it's still there?
As you can see, it is somewhere quite close to the steamship pier.
I've been to Catalina twice, maybe three times, and I don't remember seeing this, rather large, impressive fountain.

*of course I was in my early twenties at the time, and a bit squirrely, so I might have just...walked right past the fountain)



__

Oh, yes, e_r, that fountain is still there, slightly rebuilt. (I happened to be there when they laid the last brick in the renewed surrounding paving.)


gsv

It has been there back to the beginnings of recorded history, by which I mean back to my first visits to Avalon in the late 50s; and probably a couple of decades before that. As you can see by the older pic, it was pretty much where the gangway off the steamer dock debouched the steamer's passengers; and it would serve as a meeting place, as in "I'll go buy the tickets for the Inland Tour, and you go pick up a bite to eat, and we can meet at the fountain at 2:30."

Avalon seemed a magical place to li'l odinthor, so different from the mainland. For those who did not experience it in the steamer days, at the steamer's original dock, let me describe how it was to come into port. As the steamer began to approach Avalon Bay, speed boats would jet out and circle the steamer in daredevil fashion--or so it seemed to us gawkers on board ship. A blast from the steamer signaled our arrival. As the ship docked, everyone would go to the side where the gangways were, and so the ship would list to that side. But meantime I would go to the front of the ship, as I would always have a feeling as if the ship was going to continue straight ahead, right up Sumner St. in the middle of town. When it didn't, I'd go to where the passengers were tossing coins overboard for the swimmers to catch or dive and get. One would hear the rattle of the baggage carts on the planks of the pier, as the baggage was unloaded before the passengers would be allowed off. Then there was the press to get off the ship, walk along the pier, and onto terra firma in Avalon, the ramp "aimed" pretty much at the fountain. A band would be playing songs reminiscent of imaginary old Spanish days, and the locals as well as visitors who had arrived previous days would be there to meet the steamer, the idea probably being that you'd likely unexpectedly meet someone you knew from the mainland. It was all thrilling, simply thrilling. At this point, my tale ends, as we leave the proximity of the fountain . . .

[MichaelRyerson]

Originally Posted by GaylordWilshire

USCDL


We've seen this image before--looking east on Wilshire from just west of Wilton...the apartment building at left was a mystery I thought we'd covered a while back, but the posts elude me. Anyway, at the risk of repetition, it was built facing Gramercy in 1921 and moved 14 years later to Seventh St just west of St. Andrews, where it survived until 1986. The full story of the Wilshire/Gramercy corner is here.


NEVERMIND on that...found the old post. It was #37759, not even two years ago.


How about something new re the building at the NEC of Wilshire & Gramercy? Pictures of the Hi-Hat taken by Willard D. Morgan are featured in a new post on historian John Crosse's invaluable blog Southern California Architectural History. (With more here.)




HLA

By 1940, the Hi Hat will have become Perino's


View of Perino's Restaurant and Bachelors on Wilshire Boulevard, 1940


Perino's, Wilshire Boulevard, 1941


Corner, Wilshire Boulevard and Gramercy Place, Herman Schultheis

[MichaelRyerson]

Can somebody tell me what the permit history is on 754 S Olive? NE corner of Olive and 8th Street. Presently a Dunkin' Donuts with the Olive Hotel on the upper floors. Shows earthquake retrofit plates and I've got a historic aerial showing what I believe is the same roof in 1948 and a 1950 map showing the Olive Hotel at this location. Any help would be greatly appreciated.